Partners

Tag: numbers

Peaceable Kingdom has something of a corner on the market for ‘cooperative games’. These are games where everyone playing either wins together or loses together. There are no individual winners or losers.

I had a conversation with a friend a while ago and he was saying how important playing sports was for kids. They learn teamwork, reliance on others, etc. I agreed but suggested that playing in a school orchestra or band can be just as good for teaching those concepts. And music has one advantage over sports in that performing is not about winning and losing, which is not how most situations work in life. Instead, everyone in a band contributes and the group’s success is determined by the participation of everyone. These Peaceable Kingdom games are meant to promote that idea. They have lots of similar board games with the same idea.

So, the cooperative game we got was ‘Count your Chickens’. Kids take turns moving chicks into the coop, and if all 20 make it in before mama hen gets home, everyone wins. Otherwise, everyone loses. We have one child who is particularly competitive, overly competitive, and we had hoped this game would offer an alternative to the zero-sum attitude. Whether it has or not, who knows. But everyone likes it regardless.

The pieces are pretty cheaply made – like a dollar’s worth of cardboard and ink – but the game was a hit and the kids continue pulling it out every now and then. The game is so simple, on the level of ‘Candy Land’, but also includes a counting component that makes the game educational even if you don’t care about the collaborative aspect.

We try to restrict ‘screen time’ to weekends and when we do let the kids use our phones or the iPad we try to limit video usage to PBS Kids, Netflix, Hulu, or Amazon Prime. YouTube is a special case because of the quantity of ads, but also because of the content of the ads, which often is not appropriate. Further, YouTube, with its vast store of content, is a rabbit hole of discovery that can lead to inappropriate videos. An innocent search for ‘batman’, for example, can turn up raunchy spoofs that a 5-year-old should not see.

There are some (many, really) exceptions however, and we try to make sure we are around to supervise in order to prevent wandering into the YouTube equivalent of the wrong side of the tracks.

One of these exceptions is the set of ~200 videos from the unmemorably-named KidsTV123 which has had over 3 billion views since 2009.

My kids have many favorites, but the ones we adults sometimes catch ourselves humming aloud are

and

Many of the songs are true earworms, and the songwriter is a master of melody. The animation is very simple – the kind of thing that would never get distributed by a commercial network, but the kids don’t seem to care. In fact, the simplicity is part of the appeal.

The singer (and presumably also the songwriter and guitarist) is a bit of a mystery. His FAQ is not generous with details. The Week tried to profile him but came up short. But that anonymity adds to the allure and helps separate the music from the creator.